KUALA LUMPUR – Why is a convicted athlete jailed for raping a 12-year-old allowed to even participate in competitive sports, let alone qualify for the Paris Olympics?
The player in question is Steven van de Velde, a Dutch volleyball player who was convicted of raping a 12-year-old girl 10 years ago.
Van de Velde’s qualifications for the Paris Olympic Games next month has sparked a widespread controversy.
Van de Velde, now 29, was 19 when he flew from the Netherlands to the United Kingdom in August 2014 to meet the schoolgirl after they began chatting on Facebook. Despite knowing her age, he engaged in a sex act which took her virginity.
The athlete, fully aware of the girl’s young age, was sentenced in March 2016 to four years in prison after admitting to three counts of rape.
Despite the judge at the time stating that his promising career was a “shattered dream,” Van de Velde has now secured a spot at next month’s Olympics.
Partnered with Matthew Immers, in the 11th-ranked team in the world, Van de Velde qualified in the national pair, signalling a controversial return to the limelight.
Van de Velde’s interactions with the victim began when she added him on Facebook after he complimented one of her photos.
Their daily communications through Facebook, Snapchat, and Skype culminated in a meeting in Milton Keynes in August 2014.
Initially attempting to book a hotel, they ended up at Furzton Lake, where she performed a sex act on him.
The following day, they went to her empty house where he took advantage of her again, taking her virginity.
Before returning to the Netherlands, he advised her to seek the morning-after pill, a form of contraception, triggering authorities’ intervention due to her young age.
After being found guilty, the national athlete served just one year of his four-year sentence before being released in 2017.
Since then, Van de Velde has disputed claims of being a “sex monster” or paedophile. – June 26, 2024